Hélio Oiticica
Oiticica’s Parangolés (1964-1980) exemplify this shift where activating and incorporating the viewer into the artwork itself becomes an undeniable means of entirely departing from Western determination of an artwork’s worth. They foreground the lived experience of people. Rather than act as an art object to be admired and commodified, they actually served the political purpose of making visible the people residing in favelas while offering them an opportunity to act outside their social constraints. These garments are also significant because they show Oiticica creating art using the materials specific to Brazilian favelas: burlap, canvas, vinyl, etc. The physical departure from accepted modes of fine art alongside the foregrounding of real people who experience the direct impact of Brazilian classism undeniably renders the work as uniquely Latin American. What is also important is that this dynamic between artist and artwork doesn’t become exploitative. By making the actions of those in the garments the real ‘artwork’, rather than the garments themselves, while also living within the favelas himself Oiticica displays an active effort to not replicate colonial power dynamic of benefitting from the suffering of others. This demonstrates the extent to which self-examination of the role of artist and of his own Brazilian identity becomes integral to producing a uniquely Latin American art.